William Shakespeare / Referenced By - TV Tropes The basis of an observation in Calvin and Hobbes . Calvin: "They say the world is a stage. But obviously the play is unrehearsed and everybody is ad-libbing his lines." Hobbes: "Maybe that's why it's hard to tell if we're living in a tragedy or a farce." Calvin: "We need more special effects and dance numbers." The same line is repeatedly quoted in Idlewild. "The world is a stage, and the play is badly cast." Oscar Wilde . In Pearls Before Swine , the dumb crocodiles try to get a "smart" croc to intimidate their would-be prey, the Zebra, with words.

Instead, he apologizes to Zebra: "When I look upon my crocodile bretheren, I am reminded of the words of William Shakespeare, who said, to wit, 'Here come a pair of very strange beasts, which in all tongues are called fools.'" Rush , "Limelight:" "All the world's indeed a stage / and we are merely players / performers and portrayers / each another's audience outside the gilded cage." In the same episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation that provides the Hamlet -quoting Patrick Stewart Speech below, Q begins the discussion of Shakespeare by misquoting As You Like It. Picard corrects him. Q: Hear this, Picard, and reflect: "All the galaxy's a stage." Picard: "World," not "galaxy;" "all the world's a stage." Q: Oh, you know that one. Well, if he was living now, he would have said "galaxy." "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages." Dr Henry Killinger in The Venture Bros. Very chillingly delivered.

From V for Vendetta (graphic novel), V to Evey as he prepares to meet Prothero: "All the world's a stage, and everything else...is vaudeville." In Batman : Noel , as The Joker carries the unconscious Batman to his newly-dug grave, a narrator says, "Some people start hallucinating when they're about to die. In my book, if you're chasing beautiful women across rooftops and flying around with big colorful men that glow , somethin's rotten in Denmark." Beast Wars : "Tell my tale to those who ask. Tell it truly; the ill deeds along with the good, and let me be judged accordingly. The rest... is silence," says Dinobot before dying. In an earlier episode, Dinobot says: "Alas! Poor Tarantulas. I knew him, Cheetor." Dinobot was holding Tarantulas' severed spider legs though, not his severed head . Dinobot also tosses out a "To be or not to be, that is the question" when contemplating Free Will vs Fate. "How all occasions do inform against me" comes up often in Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis , they might as well be Arc Words .

Polly Churchill chooses all her aliases from Shakespeare, and she falls in with a famous Shakespearean actor who constantly speaks in allusions to the Bard. The Anthony Burgess translation of Cyrano de Bergerac riffs off the "Oh that this too too solid flesh" speech as well as quoting "In thy orisons Be All My Sins Remembered ." borrows the back half of a line: Darth Vader: I have discovered Force powers never dreamt of in your philosophy. The Departed : Before an operation, Captain Queenan tells Collin that "readiness is all." Earlier, Costigan quotes Hawthorne. Dignam isn't impressed: [fart noise] "What's the matter, smartass, you don't know any fuckin' Shakespeare?" Dragon Ball Z In the FUNimation dub of one episode, Frieza says to Vegeta, " Good Night, Sweet Prince " before attempting to finish him off. Another episode's original title says, "Savior, Thy Name Is Son Gohan!!" (a parody of the line "Frailty, thy name is woman"), though the FUNimation dub renamed it as "A Great Fighter, His Name Is Gohan".

Emilie Autumn : "Opheliac" quotes a big part of Hamlet in "Doubt thou the stars are fire/Doubt thou the sun doth move/Doubt truth to be a liar/But never doubt I love." But then, the song is basically a tribute to Hamlet's Ophelia, so this was to be expected. "Goodnight Sweet Ladies" takes its name from a quote from Ophelia. Five Iron Frenzy references Hamlet's famous soliloquy in their song "Against a Sea of Troubles". Where the Danish prince used the words to contemplate suicide, FIF uses them to signal defiance against the world until the bitter end. Frasier : An episode is titled "Roz's Krantz And Gouldenstein Are Dead". This is a reference to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (whose title is itself a line from Hamlet ). Futurama : "Something is rotten on the planet Wormulon," says Leela in "Fry and the Slurm Factory". Gettysburg : Hamlet's "What a piece of work is man" speech is said by a fictionalized version of Joshua Chamberlain.

The Major from the Hellsing Ultimate OVA quotes Hamlet, although instead of saying "there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy" he says "there are more things in heaven and hell then are dreamt of in their philosophy" In "The Duel", Clayton refers to the play when he talks with Hornblower about suicide. Clayton: Damned unsporting of the Everlasting to have fixed his canon 'gainst self-slaughter, if you ask me. In "Retribution", Lieutenant Kennedy reports the result of Mr Bush's shot on a Spanish ship by shouting "A hit, a hit, a palpable hit!" paraphrasing Osric's "a hit, a very palpable hit". In Kappa Mikey Mikey auditions for a very odd version of the play called Hamlet the Christmas Giraffe. He has a skull on hand, needless to say. The title and chapter-opening epigraphs of The King of Shreds and Patches are all from Hamlet, appropriately enough for a horror game where a good portion of the action centers around the play's first premiere.

(The titular King, however, is an avatar of The King in Yellow .) British statesman Lord Chesterfield's opinion in Letters to His Son : "for, To BE, or NOT To BE, is a question of much less importance, in my mind, than to be or not to be well." (letter 235) There are a ton of references to Hamlet in the Marathon trilogy. Marathon 2 has a level entitled "The Slings & Arrows of Outrageous Fortune". Marathon Infinity has a level called "Poor Yorick". In the level "Rise Robot Rise", Tycho compares Durandal and himself, respectively, to Claudius and Hamlet, "only I'm not crazy". Another M*A*S*H example: Winchester, at the end of the "Dreams" episode. "To sleep, perchance to dream ." Thus encouraging everyone to get another cup of coffee. An issue of Uncanny X-Men from 1975 has this speech in its opening narration. The bard of Avon said it best: "To sleep, perchance to dream...Aye, there's the rub!

For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause." And if the dreams of the dead must give us pause...what then of the dreams of the living? For example, the dreams of Charles Xavier? Winchester again referenced Hamlet on two other occasions. Once, after Hawkeye and BJ misquoted a number of Shakespearian lines for fun, Winchester quipped, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio..." prompting Hawkeye to announce, "If there's one thing I hate it's someone who butchers Shakespeare." . Later, in the episode "Private Finance", when suspecting a dead soldier of criminal activities, Winchester commented, "Methinks something's rotten in the state of Ouijongbu." The Archie Mega Man comics feature the Old Cop, Young Cop pair of Roslyn Krantz and Gilbert D. Stern. The Mighty Boosh : Howard offers death-related quotes, and at one point the 'Death, the undiscovered country' soliloquy.

In Nanki-Poo's famous song in The Mikado , the line "A thing of shreds and patches" echoes Hamlet's line, "A king of shreds and patches." And the book The 13 Clocks has its hero quote Nanki-Poo, thereby also quoting Shakespeare. Eric from Morecambe and Wise decided to do Hamlet's soliloquy because drama makes more money than comedy. After Ernie interrupting him, he eventually starts: "To be or not to be. That is the question. ... Thank you." He bows and leaves. Ernies then explains that there's more to it than that, so Eric goes back to doing comedy (after the skull comments that the entire thing was rubbish). A section of My Darling Clementine concerns Granville Thorndyke, a ham-actor with a reputation as a Shakespearean: he skips out of his scheduled appearance in a modern play in favor of drunkenly quoting Hamlet in the local saloon. Midway through his mediocre recitation of the "To be or not to be" soliloquy, he loses his place and asks for a cue.

On hearing Doc Holliday speak the next line — much better than he can — Thorndyke refuses to continue. Holliday finishes the soliloquy, imbuing it with a pathos drawn from his own death wish. In the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode "The Screaming Skull," Tom says, "Alas, poor Yorick; she threw him well!" Jack makes this reference in The Nightmare Before Christmas during "Jack's Lament." Jack: And since I am dead, / I can take off my head / to recite Shakespearean quotations! Professor Mmaa's Lecture : Two royal agents Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. At the end of Revenge of the Sith , the late Padme Amidala is actually laid out in a similar way to how Ophelia died by drowning for her funeral in Naboo after she has been strangled to death by her own husband Anakin Skywalker Darth Vader due to him completely falling to the Dark Side. In Ruddigore , Robin quotes "Alas, poor ghost!" Also, his faithful servant Adam is named after a similar character in As You Like It.

An exchange on Salute Your Shorts is inspired by Hamlet's observation that "a man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm" and therefore that "a king may go a progress through the guts of a beggar." Pinsky: Think about it. When you die they stick you in the ground and it's the worms that eat you up! Z.Z.: Then somebody digs up the worms that ate you and use to catch fish which somebody else eats. Donkeylips: So wait a second guys, when we had fish sticks the other night, I could have eaten a fish, that ate a worm, that ate Elvis? Z.Z.: You could be burping up the King as we speak! There is a SpongeBob SquarePants episode called "The Play's The Thing".

Used many, many times in all Star Trek (not just Next Generation) Notably in the sixth movie, The Undiscovered Country, with the famous quote that to truly appreciate Shakespeare, you need to hear it "in the original Klingon." "What a piece of work is a man; how noble in reason; how infinite in faculty, in form and moving how express and admirable in action; how like an angel in apprehension; how like a god." Picard proves he knows Shakespeare in Star Trek: The Next Generation . Even more impressive, Picard also notes to Q that while Hamlet said it ironically, he says it with conviction. Patrick Stewart has been in two productions of Hamlet , both in which he played Claudius , and was originally trained as a Shakespearean actor. Hair uses it for song lyrics. In Advance Wars: Dual Strike, Sonja can give that speech verbatim, then muses that she said something meaningful and asks someone to write it down. Done awesomely in Coraline . Especially since they were saying it ironically, though Coraline and unfamiliar viewers wouldn't know it at the time. "Neither a borrower nor a lender be," quotes Carey Martin in The Suite Life of Zack and Cody .

The chairman of Apocalypse, Inc. says almost the same thing in The Toxic Avenger Part II to a homeless woman asking for a dollar, specifically attributing the quote to Shakespeare. She then responds with quote from David Mamet : "Fuck you." As does "Twilight" Suzuka in Outlaw Star (at least, in the English dub), in response to Gene's request to borrow money from her . Frank Burns uses the line (rather inaptly) to Radar in a Mash episode. Super Street Fighter IV : Juri's ending includes a rather appropriate use of the phrase 'Goodnight sweet prince'. True Romance : "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark." Withnail & I has Withnail quoting the 'I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth' speech. And thereby proving he's actually a good actor Quite a few in The Wolfman (2010) , considering Lawrence is an actor in this version whose most recent play was Hamlet and the references and parallels to the play are played pretty creepily in the film. And Hamlet was famously played by Sir Lawrence Olivier.

While Wyrd Sisters is most obviously Macbeth as noted below, the Ghost of the Murdered King seeking revenge, and the idea of guilting the Duke with a play that duplicates the events of the murder are both straight from Hamlet. Ned Martin, a radio announcer for baseball's Boston Red Sox in the 1960s and '70s, was fond of using Claudius' "O Gertrude, when sorrows come, they come not single spies but in battalions" when things went bad for the team. Des McGrath in The Last Days of Disco Renaissance Man: Bill Merrily We Roll Along has the protagonist quote this in his graduation speech. (This was incorporated from the original play into the musical, but then deleted.) Arrested Development : "Well, it's like the Ten Commandments say. 'Be true to thine ownself, and to thine own self..." "Be true. Yeah.

Number seven." Peer Gynt : "Out there, under the radiant sky, they say 'To thine own self be true.' But here, in the world of trolls, we say 'To thine own self be—all-sufficient!'" "Words, words, words": In "Show Me" from My Fair Lady , Liza interrupts Freddie's romantic song verse with "Words! Words! Words! I'm so sick of words!" "Et tu, Humanite?" from Justice League episode "Injustice For All". In a form of Shout-Out Theme Naming , the dub-name of the main character's father from Kimba the White Lion is named Caesar, while a villain who had a bitter past with him is named Cassius. The Mr. Bogus episode " Et Tu, Brattus? " is a reference to the line from Act III Scene I, "Et tu, brute!" "Et tu, Gabby Gums?" from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episode "Ponyville Confidential" .

In an episode of The Odd Couple the Trigger Phrase for Oscar's post hypnotic suggestion to be neat is "The fault likes not in our stars but in ourselves." A Patsy Walker comic has Hellcat quoting mostly right a Brutus soliquoy from Act 4 while being swept by a wave ◊ : There is a tide in the affairs of men, wWhich, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the something something is uh, tied to shallows and in miseries. [...] On such a full sea are we now afloat, and we must take the current when it serves or lose our ventures. In Pearls Before Swine , Rat gets a job writing horoscopes and writes, "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in the stars, but in ourselves." When Goat tells him that Shakespeare already wrote that, he responds, "Good literature is not a race." One of Ray Stevens' albums is titled Lend Me Your Ears.

Unlike Conquest of the Planet of the Apes , where Caesar is given that name after he picks out of a dictionary, Rise of the Planet of the Apes has the chimp being named by the father of the human protagonist starting to quote Julius Caesar once he sees the baby ape. Done interestingly in Rome . The scene of Caesar's death is an incredibly tense, violent and brilliantly acted scuffle, almost free of dialogue — Caesar doesn't say "Et tu, Brute?" or anything else while he's dying, since he's too busy spasming and bleeding to death all over the marble senate floor. Instead they went with Plutarch's version of events, where he pulls his toga over his face (or tries to). However, once he's twitched his last and the conspirators are standing around shaking and silent, Cassius raises Brutus' arm and declaims, "Thus ever for tyrants!" Brutus doesn't take it well. It gets better. Instead of seeing Brutus and Antony give the legendary speeches to the plebeians, we see the aftermath, where a smug Antony sarcastically consoles Brutus for giving a good speech but perhaps "a bit too cerebral" for the crowd to appreciate.

Later, a pleb describes the speeches to his friends, showing yet another perspective of these famous monologues without showing us exactly what happened. In the next episode when Brutus goes home — thoroughly regretting his part in the whole thing — and realizes his co-conspirators are considering killing Antony too, his mother encourages him to do it, and he responds, "You too, Mother?" "Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears!" The first part is occasionally left out. In Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire , the Weird Sisters provide live entertainment for the Yule Ball. Tonks is also a Weird Sisters fan. In the film version of Prisoner of Azkaban, the song "Double Trouble" is composed of lines from the Three Witches' chant. The witch from The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past also sings/chants a couple of these lines while "making mushroom brew." In Marcus Pitcaithly's The Hereward Trilogy , a chapter entitled "Daggers in Men's Smiles" contains a flashback to the death of Macbeth. It doesn't go quite as in the play, though. In Jane Eyre , Mr Rochester quotes from Macbeth (the part with the witches).

In Princess Ida , Melissa claims her mother could not say that the three girl students are men because "'are men' stuck in her throat," spoofing a line from Macbeth II.ii. Star Fox 64 has the planet Macbeth, which according to the official Nintendo Player's Guide has its own Birnam Wood, though Andross had most of it cleared away in order to build his weapons factory. Wyrd Sisters is essentially Macbeth Discworld-style, and from the point of view of the witches. Naturally includes such lines as: As the cauldron bubbled, an eldritch voice shrieked, "When shall we three meet again?"... Another voice said, in far more ordinary tones, "Well, I can do next Tuesday." A Halloween-themed commercial for Empire Carpets spoofs the Weird Sisters' incantation. A witch stirs her cauldron, saying, "Boil, boil, toil and trouble/Time to call Empire on the double!" The ents in The Lord of the Rings and their march upon Isengard is one big shout out to Macbeth. Tolkien was simply disappointed that Great Birnham Wood didn't actually rise and come against Macbeth.

In Bored of the Rings , Goodgulf chants a Parody Magic Spell which finishes: Presto change-o The New Yorker satirized the Citizens United ruling with a cartoon where a lawyer asks the judges, "If you prick a corporation, does it not bleed? If you tickle it, does it not laugh? If you poison it, does it not die?" "If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?" (III.i) is quoted in The Pianist . Later, a character is seen reading the play; he bought it because it was appropriate for the situation. The lines "The quality of mercy is not strain'd/It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven" is quoted in several books by P. G. Wodehouse . "The man that hath no music in himself/Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils" also comes up a few times; in Thank You, Jeeves Bertie quotes it to defend his banjolele-playing when the neighbors in his flat start complaining. This line is also paraphrased by Psychopomp Mr. Coffee in On the Verge .

In Se7en the serial killer literally takes a pound of flesh from a victim. He makes the guy chose the spot it is taken from, just like in the play. "Oh, Romeo...Catch!" In Dino Attack RPG , as he was emerging from his Angst Coma , one of the thoughts flying through Rex's head was "Then I defy you, stars!" When playing as Venice in Europa Universalis III, you get prompted with a message to expand your territory, before being asked "Why not fair Verona, where we lay our scene?" In the 1993 film Gettysburg , Longstreet asks Harrison, a former actor, if he can spy the Union's position at night, Harrison quotes Juliet: "all the world will be in love with night and pay no worship to the garish sun." Romeo and Juliet makes part of the song "Flesh Failures" in the rock musical Hair . In Irregular Webcomic!

, the sysadmin and Linux-user Mercutio to his co-workers (who prefer Windows or Mac OS): "A curse on both your OSs" And in Good Omens , this line is misquoted by Wensleydale as "A plaque on both your houses!" The White Deer by James Thurber: "A plague on both your horses!" In the Justice League Unlimited episode "The Ties That Bind" Granny Goodness forces Mister Miracle and Big Barda to help rescue Kalibak from Virman Vundabar. When the two are about to finish off Granny Goodness in the end, Martian Manhunter points out the Enemy Civil War needs to continue. Scott remarks, "A curse on both their houses." "Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo? Oh, There's Romeo!" The Tick made references to the "What's in a name" line. "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet?" says Susie Barton in Time Flies . From the UK version of Whose Line Is It Anyway? , one session of Number Of Words involved the four players reenacting the final scene, with a handicap reducing all their lines to two to six words long.

Stephen Fry, who got the largest number (six) managed to work around it in a noticeably rigid fashion, uttering lines like "Once a Capulet, Always a Capulet!", "You love Romeo? You love Romeo?!" and the immortal line "I'm going to count to six." An entire boss fight in the Karazhan instance of World of Warcraft is an homage to Romeo and Juliet, featuring "Romulo" and "Julianne." The two even make quotes from various acts in the play throughout the fight. "Wherefore art thou, Romeo?" Of course, "Romeo" is often replaced with another character's name. Though "wherefore" means "why", most parodies forget that. Grease : (Putzie, referring to Sandy) The eponymous Joey says, "I did the soap thing, but I can be serious. 'Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?' That's Romeo." Shakespeare: Is that a promise, Doctor? The Doctor: Oh, fifty-seven academics just punched the air. Proust's masterpiece In Search of Lost Time has been published in English under the title Remembrance of Things Past, a line from Sonnet 30.

("When to the sessions of sweet silent thought...") The Marathon Infinity level "Poor Yorick" (itself a Shakespeare reference) has a secret terminal that consists entirely of the text from Sonnet No. 131. In an episode of My So-Called Life , Mr. Katimsky's class discusses Sonnet #130 (the one that begins, "My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun"), which leads both Brian and Jordan to make a realization about Angela . The name of Sting 's album, "...Nothing Like the Sun", is derived from the first line of that same sonnet, and that line is also borrowed in the song "Sister Moon" (which doubles as an Album Title Drop ).note Word of God says that the inspiration for this title was a close encounter with a drunk, in which Sting quoted the sonnet in response to the drunk's importunate query, "How beautiful is the moon?" Kate Wilhelm's Hugo-winning novel Where Late The Sweet Birds Sang, whose title is taken from Sonnet 73 . ("That time of year thou mayest in me behold...") Chapter Sixteen of the original Web Animation Broken Saints is called "Tempest".

Another little one in Call of Duty: Black Ops : while the player is being led into the inner sanctum of the Pentagon by Robert McNamara, the clearance codes he gives at the checkpoints are "Sycorax" and "Prospero". The Collector : The main female character is called Miranda, and she gets kidnapped by Frederick who sees himself and introduces himself as Ferdinand, because he would like to invoke a romance between them, based on the couple. Miranda thinks of him as monster and calls him Caliban. The Decemberists ' epic song "The Island" is a retelling of The Tempest In the Style of... Emerson, Lake & Palmer (well, Progressive Rock more generally, too). Exception: In the Doctor Who / Sherlock Holmes crossover All-Consuming Fire , Watson uses the line straight, to describe a future "that has such people" as Bernice Summerfield . The Firefly universe has planets named Ariel and Miranda, after characters in The Tempest. Moreover, Miranda's most famous line in The Tempest is "O brave new world, that hath such people in it!", and the planet Miranda was at one time a Brave New World -like dystopia.

If one wants to stretch it a bit, the Reavers could be seen as a reference to Caliban. There's a little one in Galaxy of Fear . A long-dead witch went by the name of Sycorax. The appetite may sicken, and so die . "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them." A very frequently parodied line, with "greatness" replaced with some other quality. Probably the most famous example is from Catch-22 : "Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them." Used as the end title card of The Miracle of Morgan's Creek . Robin Williams on George W. Bush in a 2002 concert: "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, some get it as a graduation gift, that's okay!" Emilie Autumn 's "O Mistress Mine" is based on a song from this play, and "Girls! Girls! Girls!" contains a variation on the "Some are born great..." line.

Thank You, Jeeves has Bertie trying to quote the "patience on a monument" speech, only to break down when he gets to the word "damask", which Jeeves both supplies and defines. Tales of Monkey Island has a few of the shout-outs to Shakespeare: At the beginning of the intro to Chapter 2, the Voodoo Lady quotes England's deposed king Edward IV's words to Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick (a.k.a. just Warwick), before the former is taken captive in Henry VI Part 3 : "What fates impose, that men must needs abide; / It boots not to resist both wind and tide" (IV.iii). Only her subtitle got it right ("needs"), while her voice got it wrong ("need"). In Chapter 4, if the player has Guybrush use one of the severed legs on the altar without dipping it in sugar water, he will quote a few lines in a spoof of "Alas, poor Yorick" from Hamlet (V.i) (this is done in the PS3 version in order to net the player a "Guybrush Goes Classy" silver trophy).

Speaking of PS3 trophies, there are a few trophies that are shout-outs too ("What's in a Name?" from the balcony scene of Romeo and Juliet (II.ii), and "Adieu, Adieu..." which is a reference to Hamlet's father's written line, "Adieu, adieu, remember me," from Hamlet (I.v)). In Chapter 5, Morgan stabs LeChuck and calls him a "bunch-backed toad", which is taken from the line from Richard III , in which Queen Margaret, widow of King Henry VI, curses Queen Elizabeth (wife of King Edward IV) with: "The day will come that thou shalt wish for me / To help thee curse that poisonous bunch-backed toad" (I.iii). Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru is a gender flipped Twelfth Night Adventure (right down to the most powerful cast member getting the Wholesome Crossdresser ) that quotes Hamlet ("To be, or not to be" in Japanese) and has Romeo and Juliet as the class play. In the movie Renaissance Man, Danny DeVito's character is assigned to teach a class of undereducated students on an Army base.

To that end, he takes the novel approach of using the various works of Shakespeare to kick-start their minds. An episode of The Simpsons (" Funeral for a Fiend "), when Sideshow Bob attempts to blow the Simpson family up: Sideshow Bob: Let's not tarry. As Shakespeare said, "It it were done—when 'tis done—then 'twere best / It were done quickly." Power on! [turns on the laptop as a detonator and laughs maniacally ] This time I've made no mistakes. Lisa: Actually, you made one. What Shakespeare really said was, "'twere well / It were done quickly." Sideshow Bob: Yes, I'm sure you've studied the immortal bard extensively under your "Miss Hoover." [leaves and shuts the door] Lisa: Macbeth , Act I, Scene vii. Look it up. Sideshow Bob: [reenters the room] I shall! [takes the laptop] Come on, Wikipedia . Load, you unwieldy behemoth! [the laptop explodes, and Bob falls to the ground] The Tempest Chang: Our revels now are ended.

Vorkosigan Saga : Miles Vorkosigan frequently quotes from Shakespeare, especially but not exclusively Richard III — like Shakespeare's Richard, Miles is a physically deformed smooth talker with a possible but dubious claim on the throne (although a good guy). In Brothers in Arms , he memorably recites the entire text of Richard III as a side effect of being hit with a Truth Serum . In Komarr , when his future wife, Ekaterin, is questioned if Miles had a role in her husband's death, he mentally quotes "Was any woman in this manner wooed...", referencing Richard's famous Comforting the Widow scene (I.ii). This becomes something of a "Funny Aneurysm" Moment when Miles' political enemies help make it a widespread rumor that Miles killed Ekaterin's husband. He pretends to be rehearsing a snippet from the same scene in The Warrior's Apprentice , as a hastily improvised excuse for being unchaperoned with Unlucky Childhood Friend Elena. In A Civil Campaign , he needs to write Ekaterin a letter of apology. After going through several drafts, he tries one in poetry, but grumbles, " I was not born under a rhyming planet.

" Also in A Civil Campaign, he has a conversation with Ekaterin's son Nikki about Hamlet , because Nikki is worried that Miles might have killed his father and that he'll have to get revenge. Miles points out that "Nobody expects you to carry out a really good revenge till you're at least old enough to shave," so, since Nikki is eleven, even if Miles did kill his father he doesn't have to worry about revenge for several more years. Cordelia and Mark have a conversation in Mirror Dance that heavily references The Tempest , with Mark comparing himself to Caliban. The English Classroom The English Classroom A blog aimed at creating and providing cultural material about the English speaking countries for English learners (Music, Literature, Painting,...) lunes, 20 de septiembre de 2010 Ozymandias: P.B. Shelley & Guggenheim Grotto Not long time ago I was looking for information about Percy Bysshe Shelley, the Romanticism poet and after googling his name I found a reference to Ozymandias, one of his most famous sonnets, related to the Irish band Guggenheim Grotto. I thought it was strange and obviously it could not be an accidental coincidence.

That band has got a song homonymously titled which was inspired by the poem. The name Ozymandias comes from one of the names given to Ramesses II, or Ramesses The Great, a pharaoh of Ancient Egypt. The picture below shows his colossal bust sculpted by 1250 BC which is on show at the British Museum in London. It is proved to be Shelley's source of inspiration. The theme of the sonnet is the inevitable decline of leaders. However mighty they are, they all will sooner or later fall. Shelley's poem was published in 1818 with that title, and in competition with him, Horace Smith, a poet and friend of him, wrote another sonnet with the same topic and title which was published almost at the same time. Smith later changed the title for "On A Stupendous Leg of Granite, Discovered Standing by Itself in the Deserts of Egypt, with the Inscription Inserted Below".

Percy Bysshe Shelley's Ozymandias My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun (Sonnet 130) by William Shakespeare My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red, than her lips red: If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound: I grant I never saw a goddess go, My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground: And yet by heaven, I think my love as rare, As any she belied with false compare. Publicado por Saint John of the Cross & Loreena MacKennitt Loreena MacKennitt uses sources of inspiration from many different cultures, even from the Spanish one. She has songs that make reference to Spain, such as Santiago and The Dark Night of the Soul.

It is a translation into English of the poem La Noche Oscura del Alma by Saint John of the Cross (San Juan de la Cruz). In times when the English culture permeates everything, it is remarkable to notice that English-speaking artists look at the Spanish Literature to find the starting point for their works. Here you can find the lyrics of the song and its clip. The painting is The Eve of Saint Agnes by William Holman Hunt. Loreena McKennitt The Dark Night of the Soul Upon a darkened night John Steinbeck & Bruce Springsteen Last week in a casual conversation Manolo Del Rey, a friend of mine, reminded me of the song "The Ghost of Tom Joad", which was included in the homonymous album published in 1995 by Bruce Springsteen. He wrote it inspired by John Ford's Grapes of Wrath, a filmic adaptation of John Steinbeck's homonymous novel. Thus, and although indirectly, it could be said that this song shows a literary influence on The Boss. Tom Joad is the head of the Joad family, an antihero and the literary vehicle Steinbeck uses to portray the Great Depression America of the 1930s in that masterpiece of the English literature.

This author was awarded the 1962 Literature Noble Prize. Here you can find the lyrics of Springsteen's song and its clip.

The Ghost of Tom Joad by Bruce Springsteen Men walkin' 'long the railroad tracks Goin' someplace there's no goin' back Highway patrol choppers comin' up over the ridge Hot soup on a campfire under the bridge Shelter line stretchin' round the corner Welcome to the new world order Families sleepin' in their cars in the southwest No home no job no peace no rest The highway is alive tonight But nobody's kiddin' nobody about where it goes I'm sittin' down here in the campfire light Searchin' for the ghost of Tom Joad He pulls prayer book out of his sleeping bag Preacher lights up a butt and takes a drag Waitin' for when the last shall be first and the first shall be last In a cardboard box 'neath the underpass Got a one-way ticket to the promised land You got a hole in your belly and gun in your hand Sleeping on a pillow of solid rock Bathin' in the city aqueduct The highway is alive tonight But where it's headed everybody knows I'm sittin' down here in the campfire light Waitin' on the ghost of Tom Joad Now Tom said "Mom, wherever there's a cop beatin' a guy Wherever a

 hungry newborn baby cries Where there's a fight 'gainst the blood and hatred in the air Look for me Mom I'll be there Wherever there's somebody fightin' for a place to stand Or decent job or a helpin' hand Wherever somebody's strugglin' to be free Look in their eyes Mom you'll see me." The highway is alive tonight But nobody's kiddin' nobody about where it goes I'm sittin' downhere in the campfire light With the Ghost of ol' Tom Joad.

Publicado por Irish Literature Noble Prizes Today I am going to start reviewing all the greatest writers coming from the English speaking countries. However, this is always a controversial topic since any classification is conditioned by subjectivism and a point of view. Thus, I am going to use an objective criterion. This is an introduction of the Literature Noble Prizes, starting with Ireland. The land of James Joyce, Oscar Wilde and Sean O'Casey is also the land of Yeats, Shaw, Beckett and Heaney, who are the four Noble winners that Ireland had. Here are their photos and a quotation from their award speech. 1923 William Butler Yeats "for his always inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation. 1925 George Bernard Shaw "for his work, which is marked by both idealism and humanity, its stimulating satire often being infused with a singular poetic beauty". 1969 Samuel Beckett "for his writing, which -innew forms for the novel and drama - in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation" 1995 Seamus Heaney T.S.

Eliot & Crash Test Dummies Here what I want to reflect upon is about the influence of literature on nowadays music. To start with, I am going to establish the relation between T.S. Eliot and The Crash Test Dummies. This Canadian folk-rock band released the album God Shuffled his feet in 1989, which included the song "Afternoons & Coffeespoons". The allusions to the poet and to the content of the poem The lovesong of Alfred J. Prufrock are numerous and obvious. The lyrics of this song are as follows: Afternoons and Coffeespoons What is it that makes me just a little bit queasy? There's a breeze that makes my breathing not so easy I've had my lungs checked out with X rays I've smelled the hospital hallways Someday I'll have a disappearing hairline Someday I'll wear pyjamas in the daytime Times when the day is like a play by Sartre When it seems a bookburning's in perfect order - I gave the doctor my description I tried to stick to my prescriptions.

Someday I'll have a disappearing hairline Someday I'll wear pyjamas in the daytime Afternoons will be measured out Measured out, measured with Maybe if I could do a play-by-playback I could change the test results that I will get back I've watched the summer evenings pass by I've heard the rattle in my bronchi ... Someday I'll have a disappearing hairline Someday I'll wear pyjamas in the daytime Afternoons will be measured out Measured out, measured with Coffeespoons and T.S. Eliot(2x) And of course here is the whole poem that I have mentioned. I am a great enthusiast of the first poems that T.S. Eliot published, specially those included in Prufrock and Other Observations, in 1917. He submitted them to the great Ezra Pound to be corrected and the authority can be said to be shared. In spite of his personal evolution, these poems are full of experimentation and denunciation of our alienated society, which make his poetry quite modern. T.S. Eliot (1888–1965). Prufrock and Other Observations. 1917. 1.

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse A persona che mai tornasse al mondo, Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse. Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero, Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo. LET us go then, you and I, When the evening is spread out against the sky Like a patient etherised upon a table; Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, The muttering retreats 5 Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: Streets that follow like a tedious argument Of insidious intent To lead you to an overwhelming question … 10 Oh, do not ask, “What is it?” Let us go and make our visit. In the room the women come and go Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes, 15 The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening, Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains, Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys, Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap, 20 And seeing that it was a soft October night, Curled once about the house, and fell asleep. And indeed there will be time For the yellow smoke that slides along the street, Rubbing its back upon the window-panes; 25 There will be time, there will be time To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet There will be time to murder and create, And time for all the works and days of hands That lift and drop a question on your plate; 30 Time for you and time for me, And time yet for a hundred indecisions, And for a hundred visions and revisions, Before the taking of a toast and tea. In the room the women come and go 35 Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?” Time to turn back and descend the stair, With a bald spot in the middle of my hair— 40 [They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”] My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin, My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin— [They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”] Do I dare 45 In a minute there is time For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. For I have known them all already, known them all:— Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, 50 I have measured out my life with coffee spoons; I know the voices dying with a dying fall Beneath the music from a farther room. So how should I presume? And I have known the eyes already, known them all— 55 The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase, And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin, When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall, Then how should I begin To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?

60 And how should I presume? And I have known the arms already, known them all— Arms that are braceleted and white and bare [But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!] It is perfume from a dress 65 That makes me so digress? Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl. And should I then presume? And how should I begin? . . . . . Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow street 70 And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?… I should have been a pair of ragged claws Scuttling across the floors of silent seas. . . . . . And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! 75 Smoothed by long fingers, Asleep … tired … or it malingers, Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me. Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?

80 But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed, Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter, I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter; I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker 85 And in short, I was afraid. And would it have been worth it, after all, After the cups, the marmalade, the tea, Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me, Would it have been worth while, 90 To have bitten off the matter with a smile, To have squeezed the universe into a ball To roll it toward some overwhelming question, To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead, Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”— 95 If one, settling a pillow by her head, Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.

That is not it, at all.” And would it have been worth it, after all, Would it have been worth while, 100 After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor— And this, and so much more?— It is impossible to say just what I mean! But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen: 105 Would it have been worth while If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl, And turning toward the window, should say: “That is not it at all, That is not what I meant, at all.” 110 . . . . . No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; Am an attendant lord, one that will do To swell a progress, start a scene or two, Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool, Deferential, glad to be of use, 115 Politic, cautious, and meticulous; Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; At times, indeed, almost ridiculous— Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old … I grow old … 120 I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled. Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach? I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach. I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think that they will sing to me. 125 I have seen them riding seaward on the waves Combing the white hair of the waves blown back When the wind blows the water white and black. We have lingered in the chambers of the sea By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown 130 Till human voices wake us and we drown. Publicado por

Question: What album of Sting takes its title from a sonnet he quoted in response to a drunk's query, "How beautiful is the moon?"?
Answer: ...Nothing Like the Sun